Disturbingly lifelike puppets take the place of human beings in this independent surreal horror film. The effect always makes for a highly unique and artistically accomplished movie, though it is one that is otherwise not always a success. Abruptio is admittedly imperfect and has a number of notable flaws, but the fact that something so individualistic was given the obvious care it needed to come to fruition is noteworthy and admirable in and of itself.
The film starts out quite strong, focusing on a thirty-five-year-old man named Les (voiced by the fantastic Buffy the Vampire Slayer actor James Marsters) who works a monotonous and thankless job, is struggling to remain sober, lives with his mother, and has just been dumped by his girlfriend. My favorite parts of the film are the perfectly paced early short scenes that set up Les’ numbing and passionless existence. I’ve never been quite so entertained by boredom.
The plot kicks into gear after Les discovers a bomb that has been inexplicably implanted into the back of his neck. He is then horrifically instructed through mysterious text messages to murder innocent people or the bomb will be detonated. Les discovers what he is capable of when he gives in to self-preservation and carries out the crimes.
The first half-hour or so of the film verges on greatness. Unfortunately, its quality drops somewhat the more the plot progresses and becomes increasingly convoluted and difficult to follow. For such a Kafkaesque and nightmarish premise, the movie would have worked better had its script followed a simpler plot that allowed the film’s disturbing atmosphere, tense tone, dark humor, and unreal reality to take precedence. Instead, the audience is sometimes forced to stop and take themselves out of the movie to try to make sense of the story’s unnecessary complexities. Would Eraserhead have been as good with an intricately detailed mystery at its core? I don’t think so.
The film is also marred somewhat by its low-budget technical limitations. Lighting is often flat, and select camera angles don’t always edit together particularly well. Human stand-ins for wide shots of the puppets can be rather obvious and distracting. Perhaps worst of all, there’s a small but noticeable chunk of the film where Les has obviously been replaced by a new puppet that looks almost nothing like him.
Criticisms aside, Abrutpio still manages to be an overall impressive and rather massive accomplishment in independent filmmaking. The puppet designs (with the exception mentioned above) are almost entirely worthy of praise. The film’s odd otherworldliness that exists due to their presence offers one of the most successful and exciting examples of an artistic risk that I have seen in a movie in recent years.
The film can be confusing, but it’s never boring. It can be frustrating, but it never entirely loses you. The further into it you get, you simply learn to give in, let go, enjoy it, and take its mess of a storyline for what it is. The ending is ultimately and surprisingly satisfying (though the less said about it, the better), which makes the bumpy road getting there somewhat forgivable.
I wish Abruptio had been rewritten and rethought during its preproduction stages. The story doesn’t quite work as it is, but the ingenuity behind its execution still makes for a worthwhile film. It has a quality that can’t be denied and it casts a spell that is consistently intoxicating despite being disrupted on numerous occasions. It has greatness within it, but it isn’t quite great. Abruptio is far from perfect, but it’s still one hell of an inventive and cool little movie.
GRADE: B
